Happy Birthday to Me!

Dearest Family and friends,

 

what an interesting week.

last week was B.A.D. bad!!! and i was praying that this week would be better. it was. mas o menos.

first of all, thank yo ALL for the happy birthday emails. im STOKED to read them all!!!! i have not recieved any of the foretold packages yet.... im praying they arent in mexico or china by now..... ill keep ya posted. no stress. but maybe, send christmas packages next week to be safe.... just a joke.

 

Birthday celebration with the members. They are fun and I love them. They make me feel pretty loved. I don't know why they made me wear the funny head band. Weird Peruvian traditions I'll never understand.

Happy birthday to me!

Surprise birthday from my Penchionista. Lo maximo! We had a grand old time. I taught them all the cup rhythm and we were so loud, the neighbors called and told us to be quiet. But we didn't care. We were laughing too hard. Life is good.

 

 

we had a baptism!!! BY A MIRACLE! let me tell you about Lucia. she is 64  years old, but she doenst know that. she cant remember her birtday. she had an accident and her memory is AWEFUL! we showed her a picture of joseph smith and asked "who is this?" she replied "jesucristo".... this happened four times. you can imagine how our lessons went..... she cannot read or write, and she is teh cutest little woman ever! she is the classic peruvian woman who carries straw on her back for miles. she is the one, her most prized posession is her sheep. if you remember me telling you about her. she takes care of her two grand babies, who dont have support form their mom. mom refuses to pay to take care of them and she works in a bar. ugly situation. very humble people. and it breaks my heart. well thats lucia for ya. 
so get this, so we go to pick her, with the baptism all planned, and everthing ready to go, including a taxi outside waiting for her.... and she says, "no voy a bautizarme"..... (translation: i am not going to be baptised) my heart sank-. not again. i could not believe that this was happening AGAIN! we already lost trust with our members cause our LAST baptism fell through, i could not believe it was happening agian. i was slipping back into that dark place again. and i could see my companions were doing the same. 

we sat there convincing her for about 20 minutse, and i could tell the spirit was NOT THERE! she felt bombarded, and why would anyone want to be baptised with that feeling there. i got the thought, what if we started like we normally do, and invite the spirit. with a song and a prayer. so i asked my companions if we could do that. they were so frustrated, i think they thought it wouldnt work and it was a waste. but i didnt care. i knew it was a prompting. so we opened up the himario to my favorite hymn, Granderes tu, and sang two verses. then, we knelt in prayer with our investigator. i said it,. and president, i have never said such a fervent prayer out loud in my whole mission. probably my whole life! i knelt there on the dirty ground, in my pretty yellow dress and my curled hair, with what seemed like my last ounce of faith, and cried to the lord. help our investigator remember (and she has memory issues due to an accident) the feelings of the spirit and why she wanted to be baptised initially. 
at the end of the prayer, as we were all in tears, she stood up, adn with out a word, went to change into her pretty pink skirt to get ready for the baptism. it was a miracle. and my faith was restored.

 

i dont think i have ever rejoiced for a soul saved like i did for her!!!

the baptism was beautiful. i know it was Gods birthday gift to me. :) feliz hna gonzals

 

Lucia, our recent convert

Lucia's sheep

 

 

also this week, our biggest weakness as a companionship is contacting. we are supposed to contact 70 ever week. and we have been getting 50 or so. so, to make up for this, we did somethign kind of fun in the park. i said, i want to stand up on this bench and start singing. my comps thought i was crazy. so i said, how about this, i WONT sing on the bench if we can find a guitar.....

guess what. a member walking home from school with his buddies walked by WITH A GUITAR! DONE!

 

so we contacted 25 teenagers and 3 families with music. and some had this little spinning top toy, you wrap it up with a string and throw it and it spins on the ground, and you can pick it up WHILE its sinning and it spins in your hand! i learned how to play with one of those, and the boys thought i was so funny trying my hardest to do it just right, they ended up giving it to me as a gift. to the gringa misionera. its so sweet! im excited to show you in a year.

 

we had a noche misional, and we did the tree of life adventure! they walked through different rooms in the church in the dark, holding onto the iron rod until they came to the tree of life and took a white balloon with candy inside off the tree. (the fruit) i was pretty proud of our work. it was a success.

 

Noche misional. Tree of Life activity. We were the guides like Lehi was guided by an angel through the darkness.

 

 

lots of fun parties witht he members as well for my special day. 

YAY 20! birthday in peru! not everyone can say that. 

soy muy contenta y feliz. les amo much! 

 

con amor, 

hna gonzales  

 

 

ps i searched 15 music stores for a ukulele. elder brown had baughten THE LAST ONE! didnt buy one for my bday.  . . :( one day ill have a ukulele. learned another song.

learned granderes tu (how great thou art)

:)